Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Rather than an overall season summary, here's a quick overview of how each of Frontale's first team players have fared in 2008.

Some get more of the limelight than others in the match reports, so it's only fair that all the contributors get a bit of attention. That said, some of the less frequent participants - Tasaka, Yabu, Kukino, to name a few - have been glossed over. Maybe we'll see more of them in 2009.

Decent enough season for big Eiji. 42 goals conceded in 34 J.League games isn't a particularly flattering statistic, but it could have been a lot worse without "safe hands" Kawashima tending the net.

He's an excellent shot stopper and rarely spills even the fiercest drives. The one aspect of his game that lets him down at the moment is his lack of communication with his defenders. One would imagine this will improve with experience.

Very important season coming up for Eiji if he wants to be Japan's No.1 at the 2010 World Cup.

Very impressed with Ito this year. Assured under pressure and probably the only Frontale defender not to have attempted an audition for the "Keystone Cops", he's even got his name on the scoresheet a couple of times after several barren years.

Playing in a back 3 he was sometimes left exposed by Yamagishi's lack of defensive metal, but he's looked very comfortable on the left of a flat back 4. The only question mark going into next year is whether he still has the pace to play as an out-and-out fullback.

2008 will have been a strange year for Yamagishi. He made the move from JEF, the club he's been with since schoolboy days, only to discover his new team seems incapable of utilising his strengths but has great ease in exposing his weaknesses.

Although the evidence this year was all too fleeting, Yamagishi is clearly a good wing player, and arguably the best crosser of the ball the team possesses. The problem is that he spent a large chunk of the season as wingback where he saw much more of the ball in his defensive role than in attack.

Presumably Sekizuka had a clear idea of how he wanted Yamagishi to fit into the side. It'll be one of his biggest challenges to now realise that plan.

We've already spoken enough about the shoddy hand that fate has dealt Kazuki in the past few years. Focussing purely on on-field activity this year, it has to be said that his position behind Juninho, Chong Tese and Renatinho in the pecking order was fully justified.

The decision that he should move on at this juncture was surely motivated by the player as much as by the club. Hopefully he can now succeed in getting his career back on track.

Juninho has been Frontale's best player and their worst player in equal measure this year. For whatever reason, the whole Hulk debacle seemed to affect him very badly and he looked a shadow of his former self for the first few months of the season. The goals eventually started to come, but it was as provider rather than scorer that he really came to the fore.

Juninho will alway score goals because he's not afraid to shoot. However, 2008's ratio was down to only 1 goal every 10 shots. Maybe now it's time for the Brazilian to focus more on creation rather than execution.

I don't think it's too strong to say that Vitor's arrival was the singlemost important event of 2008. In Vitor, Frontale finally found someone to fill the gaping hole left in the midfield by Magnum's move to Nagoya. And he's only 22 years old (officially!).

Scoring the winning goal away to Urawa Reds in your debut is bound to leave a lasting impression, but Vitor completely revitalised the team, most notably Juninho who was like a new man in the second half of the season.

He did seem to run out of steam a little in the last few weeks, but expect to see great things once he's rested and back to full fitness in 2009.

A bit of a mixed bag for Shuhei this year. Like Igawa, he's been terribly error-prone at times and had a long battle with injury in the middle of the season. Then again, he's had some really commanding performances which have been rewarded by the Japan NT selectors.

His biggest challenge for 2009 is trying to keep injury at bay - something which, at his age, is becoming more and more difficult.

In some ways Kengo will surely be glad to see the back of 2008. Not only did he find himself captaining a team in crisis early on in the year, he was also the only player on the pitch creative enough to open up the opposition defence, as well as being the only defensively-minded midfielder looking to protect the men behind him.

It has to be said, he's been short of spectacular this season, which (from him) is a little disappointing. However, when taking into account the huge responsibility he's had to bear it's certainly excusable. Here's hoping Sekizuka will take some of the burden off his shoulders.

Kengo is another player for whom 2009 will be pivotal in deciding his 2010 World Cup fate.

Despite occasionally playing like he's never seen a football before, let alone kicked one, Chong Tese has cemented himself as a core member of the Frontale team in 2008. His strength makes him an ideal target man for long balls and his finishing can, at times, be world class.

There is undoubtedly room for improvement. He has games where he loses possession with alarming ease and regularity, and his accuracy in front of goal can be as dazzling woeful as it is sometimes dazzling brilliant. The important thing, however, is that he is improving season by season. Try not to be too surprised if you see him collecting the golden boot award this time next year.

Kikuchi was the defensive option introduced in midfield to free up Kengo. To be blunt, it didn't really work.

He's still only 23 years old, but I think if he wants to develop as a defensive midfielder he needs to be at a club where there's already an experienced expert in that position to help bring his game on.

Yokoyama impressed greatly when he filled in for the injuries at centre back in the middle of the season. As well as being solid defensively, he looks very comfortable in possession, even in advanced areas of the field, which is something of a rarity. Look forward to seeing much more in 2009.

Like Yamagishi, Mori isn't ideally suited to the role of wingback because he doesn't have the requisite defensive fortitude. Unlike Yamaigishi, however, Mori does see a lot of the ball in attacking positions and has repeatedly impressed with his ability to go past defenders and get balls in from the bye-line.

A long spell out with injury this season hasn't helped Mori fully establish his worth and one wonders if this will affect Sekizuka's choices in terms of player acquisitions and system re-organisation for 2009.

It's been said before, but the arrival of Vitor put paid to Ohashi's Frontale career.

He showed great vision and a good passing range in the early stages of the season. But he seems to be very much a confidence player and when only getting the occasional chance to impress from the bench he was never able to turn on the magic. Hopefully he'll get more opportunities to prove his undoubted talent at his new club.

Listed as a midfielder, this season has shown that if Murakami is anything, he's a full back.

Given a chance to show what he's made of when Mori got injured early in the year, there was an obvious contrast between the two players' skill sets - what Mori lacks in defence, Murakami lacks in attack.

The wingback role really doesn't suit him, but the move to a back 4 later in the year allowed him to show that he's certainly got what it takes as an out-and-out defender.

An eventful year for Taniguchi - not least due to his summer spent in Beijing with an underperforming Japanese Olympic team.

He's won a lot of fans in 2008, not just for the number of goals he's notched up, but also for the significant stages at which those goals have come - single-handedly rescuing games on a few occasions. His overall contribution has sometimes been called into question, but even here there has been a definite improvement and plenty of hope for more.

He seems to have taken a lot from his international experience and is clearly learning a lot from playing alongside the likes of Kengo and Vitor. Not sure he's got what it takes to move on to the next level and book a ticket to South Africa, but certainly happy to be proved wrong.

Is this the man destined to take over Juninho's mantle as Frontale's star striker? There have certainly been promising signs in 2008, but there have also been question marks - particularly over his attitude.

Renatinho has great ball control, a good finish and looks to have the best striker's instinct of any of Frontale's forwards. He also has the kind of arrogance that can either give an added edge to a striker's game or, if left unchecked, ruin a promising career. Hopefully the experienced Juninho can guide his young fellow countryman along the right path.

Well, you can unfasten those seatbelts now. Kashima's win in Sapporo put an end to the dream and ensured the J1 crown will stay in Ibaraki for another year. Still, for Frontale to have taken it to the final day of the season is an accomplishment in itself. And Saturday's 2-0 win over Verdy secures both a very respectable 2nd spot in the table and, more importantly, a place in next year's Asian Champions League.

The match itself wasn't the great spectacle it should have been. Needing to make up 4 goals against the Antlers to stand any chance of topping the league, Frontale came out with all guns blazing. But an inexplicable red card for Verdy's Takashi Fukunishi midway through the first half put a strange spin on the contest that the visitors struggled to deal with.

It would be wrong to talk about "opening exchanges" because that would suggest Verdy had some influence on the game's early stages. As it was, they spent most of the time looking on as their opponents tested the quality of their woodwork.

Frontale should have been a goal up within the first minute, but Juninho managed to hit a seated defender rather than the gaping target of an open goal - the ball rebounding off the post and into the keeper's grateful hands. The prodigal Brazilian was then just inches away from getting a toe on the end of a slightly misdirected Taniguchi strike. His third chance saw him hook the ball onto the crossbar from 3 yards out following a decent save from a Chong Tese shot.

Still, nothing particularly strange about Juninho failing to convert chances, and Verdy were offering nothing in return. It seemed only a matter of time before the floodgates finally opened.

Then in stepped the referee to change the tide of the game. Looking to clear the ball after a Frontale corner, Fukunishi swung his arm to get a bit more leverage. Whatever contact there was with Shuhei Terada, who was standing behind him, was minimal and certainly not malicious, but the referee saw fit to issue a straight red card and award Frontale a penalty. Utterly baffling.

There was a long hold up while Verdy players inquired about the referee's optical health - understandable, given the very real (and ultimately realised) threat of relegation to J2. When Fukunishi finally left the field it was just left for Juninho to send his spot-kick wide and add more fuel to an already stoked Verdy fire.

With the home side now primed for a fight the game changed. They worked much harder to close Frontale down and started to show some attacking threat. Although Eiji Kawashima was never really tested, they managed to amass a reasonable shot count and even had a couple of penalty shouts of their own.

However, as the second half wore on the numerical difference started to take its toll. Gaps started to reappear in the Verdy defence, and although for a while Frontale still seemed unable to put the game to bed, the inevitable breakthrough eventually arrived - Renatinho showing great centre-forward's instinct to get in front of his marker and dispatch a Juninho cross. The result was then put beyond doubt by a fizzing 20-yard strike from captain Kengo in the dying minutes.

And so there you have it. The end of another sparkling season of J.League football. And plenty to look forward to next year...if only it wasn't 3 months away!

Wednesday, December 03, 2008

As if the excitement of the last leg of the title chase isn't enough, news now comes in that the doors to the Todoroki dressing rooms have already started revolving.

The biggest news is that Takashi Sekizuka - the man who steered Frontale from J2 obscurity to the ACL quarter finals - is officially to resume control of the team as of next season. Tsutomu Takahata will revert to his former role as assistant coach.

Sekizuka was forced to quit as coach in April 2008 for health reasons, but it seems the door has always been left open for him should he wish to return. And after a season of rest and recuperation he's now decided there's unfinished business to attend to.

When he does return, however, he'll have 5 fewer faces to choose from as it's also been announced that contracts will not be renewed for the following players:

Ganaha's had a torrid couple of seasons. First there was the year out due to "garlic-gate". Then, just as he's starting to regain some form, Renatinho arrives on the scene. Still, he's proven his quality in the past and will be a good signing for a team that can make the most of his abilities.

Ohashi's another player who'll benefit from finding a club that can give him more first team opportunities. Like Ganaha, Ohashi suffered from the mid-season signings. Before Vitor Junior's arrival, he was threatening to cement a place in the starting eleven. Ever since, he's been glued to the bench with the occasional 5 mintes here and there.

I haven't seen enough of the other 3 to make any meaningful comment, but thanks and good luck to them all.